The Devil's Cliff Killings

by Simon McCleave

  ‘Go and have a word. See if they saw anyone up at the observation point.’

  As Ruth turned to go, she saw Sian approaching and her stomach lurched. She didn’t have the emotional wherewithal to have any type of conversation.

  ‘Quick word, boss,’ Sian said.

  ‘I’m on my way to interview Kathy Wright,’ Ruth explained.

  ‘Steven Haddon is downstairs. He’s found something that he thinks you should see straightaway. But he wanted to talk to you,’ Sian explained.

  Ruth felt deflated and a little stupid that she had assumed Sian was coming to talk to her about their situation rather than the case.

  ‘Right, I’ll go and see him now.’

  CHAPTER 28

  Six days, nineteen hours

  Interview Room Three was the least intimidating of the interview rooms at Llancastell nick and the one that Ruth used for informal meetings rather than the more complex official interviews of suspects.

  As Ruth entered, she could feel that the air conditioning was working.

  Thank God for that!

  It was a stark relief to the CID offices on the sixth floor.

  Steven Haddon was sitting at the table, his elbows resting casually on its wooden surface. She could see that both of his thick, tanned forearms were tattooed.

  ‘Steven, sorry to have kept you,’ Ruth said as she sat down opposite. She wondered what he had found that had prompted him to make the journey over to Llancastell.

  ‘I spoke to the guy on the reception,’ he said as he gestured to a plastic wallet that contained printed documents. ‘I found these in my printer last night. They must have got jammed, but I thought you should see them.’

  ‘Okay,’ Ruth said as she took the documents from the wallet and turned them over to have a look.

  The document was entitled: What is life like in the UK’s witness protection programme? – Linda’s testimony put this murderous gang behind bars. Now she lives in a different part of the country as part of the police’s witness protection programme.

  ‘They don’t have a printer next door, so sometimes Rosie comes over and uses ours. You know, if her and Emma have got college work to do,’ Steven explained.

  ‘You think that Rosie printed this off?’ Ruth asked.

  ‘I think so. She came over the day before she disappeared. I asked Emma and she said Rosie was printing some stuff for her media studies’ course. She was the last person to use the printer,’ Steven said.

  ‘Okay, thank you. This is very useful,’ Ruth said.

  ‘Once I found these, I went onto the Google page and found out the search history,’ Steven said and shrugged. ‘I thought it might be useful?’

  Ruth nodded. The more clues they had to what Rosie was doing and thinking before she was taken, the better. ‘Yes, that’s very helpful.’

  ‘I wrote it down for you,’ Steven said as he passed her a slip of paper. On it was written a question: Can you go into the witness protection programme if you are a teenager?

  HALF AN HOUR LATER, Ruth launched another question at Kathy Wright – she was on the ropes, but she just wasn’t willing to go down and concede.

  ‘You just need to tell us what happened to Rosie?’ Ruth snapped. The interview with Kathy Wright had been going around in circles.

  Ruth had already relayed to Kathy everything they knew now that Gareth Wright had started to tell the truth.

  ‘Rosie knew what you and Gareth were up to, didn’t she? She confronted you and threatened to go to the police. Rosie had researched the police witness protection programme and whether it was applicable to teenagers.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about!’

  ‘You needed to keep Rosie quiet or face a very long prison sentence. What happened, Kathy? You attempted to abduct her, but she struggled. Was that it?’ Ruth was becoming increasingly forceful as she tried to apply pressure.

  ‘I don’t know what happened to Rosie. She’s my daughter and she’s missing. I’m not lying to you,’ Kathy said.

  ‘Explain the blood in Gareth’s car and at the car park by the cliffs?’ Ruth barked.

  ‘I can’t, can I?’ Kathy said as she shook her head.

  Ruth had come across many criminals who had flatly denied their crimes before. Even in the face of compelling evidence. However, she had never seen a mother so emphatically deny having anything to do with what had happened to her daughter. It was sickening to watch.

  ‘What, so it just magically appeared?’ Ruth was riled and wanted Kathy to just do the right thing and tell the truth.

  ‘For fuck’s sake, I keep telling you, I don’t know.’

  ‘And the footprints at the clifftops? Any minute now, our forensic team will have looked at the moulds of those footprints to see if they match the shoes that we have taken from your house,’ Ruth said.

  Kathy sat back with a frustrated groan and shrugged aggressively. ‘We didn’t even get out of the car.’

  ‘Just do the right thing, Kathy. Stop lying to me, for Rosie’s sake. There is overwhelming evidence that you and Gareth murdered her, put her in his car, drove her up to Gogarth and threw her body into the sea. You’re both going to be convicted of her murder. If you have any decency in you, tell us what happened to Rosie.’

  In a split second, Kathy exploded. She pushed the chair back violently, stood up and lunged at Ruth. ‘How dare you, you bitch! I’ve told you the truth!’

  Backing away, Ruth glared at her. ‘Sit down, right now, or I’ll add assaulting a police officer to all the other charges!’

  The duty solicitor, who was looking a little shocked, glanced at Ruth. ‘I request that I have some time with my client. And that we have a break so that my client can compose herself.’

  Ruth nodded. ‘I think that’s a very good idea.’

  NICK SCRATCHED AT HIS beard. It was getting too long, especially in the summer heat. Added to that, his move from neat semi-stubble to full-on explorer beard had prompted jokes such as ‘Where’s your ark, Noah?’ and general derisory comments about being a hipster wanker.

  Beside Nick and his computer, an elderly couple were starting to work through a computer identity parade. Their car had been spotted leaving Gogarth on Tuesday evening. When interviewed, the couple confirmed they had seen a man and woman in a black VW Golf park beside them at the observation car park. They thought they might recognise their faces. They told Nick they had got a good look at both of them.

  In 2017, there had been a revision of Code D of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984. Rather than the traditional identity parade of similar-looking members of the public and the suspect, the evidence could be gathered through a computer line up. Nick knew that in the old days, trying to get hold of a significant number of members of the public that looked similar to their suspect took ages. Sometimes weeks. Using the computer database, the process could be done in a matter of hours. It also meant that witnesses were far more relaxed giving evidence, not having to actually see the suspect in front of them.

  The couple were going to attempt to identify Gareth Wright first. Giving them his best reassuring smile, Nick clicked his mouse and the first image of a young man in his early twenties.

  ‘Okay, so take your time. There’s no rush. I’ll go through all twelve images slowly. If you see the young man that was in the car park at Gogarth last Monday, just tell me. Or we can go through all the photos and then you can tell me.’

  ‘What if we get it wrong?’ the elderly woman asked nervously.

  Nick smiled and leaned forward. ‘You can’t get it wrong. Please don’t worry about this. If you see him, tell me. If you don’t, there’s no harm done, is there?’

  ‘Okay, sorry,’ the woman said with a little self-deprecating laugh.

  Her husband reached over and took her hand. ‘It’s fine.’

  For the next five minutes, Nick clicked through a series of images of young men in their early twenties who bore some resemblance to Gareth Wright.

 
Clicking on image number eight, Gareth Wright’s face appeared on the screen.

  Immediately, the couple’s facial expressions and body language changed. They looked at each other and nodded.

  ‘Yes, that’s the man we saw last Tuesday. Mary?’ the husband said.

  ‘Oh yes. It’s definitely him,’ his wife replied.

  CHAPTER 29

  Six days, twenty-one hours

  It was five o’clock as Ruth and Drake walked down the corridor together. They were on their way to the meet with the CPS.

  ‘How’s your wife doing?’ Ruth asked, conscious that even with everything going on with the Rosie Wright search, Drake was still dealing with the emotional burden of his wife’s cancer diagnosis.

  ‘Paula? Oh, good. Test results from yesterday were very positive. Thanks for asking,’ Drake said, his face lined with concern still showed how relieved he was.

  Ruth’s phone rang – it was Professor Roy White from the Abel UK Forensic Laboratory. She gestured to the phone as they reached the meeting room. ‘Better take this, boss.’

  Drake nodded. ‘Of course.’

  ‘Professor White. Thanks for ringing me back. What did you find?’ Ruth asked.

  ‘Well, I’ve got good news on two fronts. There is wear on the right side of Gareth Wright’s trainer, below the ball of the foot. It’s an exact match for the wear that we found on the size-ten footprint on the soil at the cliff edge,’ White said.

  ‘Great,’ Ruth said. ‘What about Kathy Wright?’

  ‘Different type of wear. More from the heel on this one. But Kathy Wright’s trainer sole is an exact match for the size-five footprint we found too.’

  ‘Brilliant,’ Ruth said, giving Drake an encouraging nod. They had conclusive physical evidence that Gareth and Kathy Wright stood on the cliff edge at Gogarth.

  ‘The other match that we examined the trainers for was soil and anything else that was found on the soles,’ White explained. ‘Cliff tops have a particular make-up due to the soil erosion caused by their exposure to the coastal elements. It leaves the soil thin and close to the chalk and granite of the cliffs. The soil from where the footprints were found, and the soil found on the two trainers are an identical match.’

  This was fantastic news for Ruth. Two pieces of hard, physical evidence that directly linked Kathy and Gareth Wright to the crime scene at Gogarth.

  ‘It you put me on the stand, DI Hunter, I will testify categorically that the owners of these two pairs of trainers were standing on the cliff edge at Gogarth in the last ten days.’

  Ruth nodded and shared a look of victory with Drake. Kathy and Gareth Wright were evil bastards and were going to prison for a very long time.

  ‘Thank you, Professor. That’s very good news.’ Ruth finished the call. ‘Trainer prints and soil samples match. Kathy and Gareth Wright were on that cliff top.’

  Drake gestured to the meeting room they were about to enter. ‘Good work .... Let’s see what Miss Finshore has to say now.’

  They entered the meeting room and made their introductions. Zara Finshore, an experienced prosecutor for the Crown Prosecution Service, was sitting waiting for them. Her brunette hair was pulled back into a ponytail and she wore a smart blouse that was cut low. Up to this point, Finshore had been Ruth’s point of contact at the CPS each time a significant piece of evidence came in or the investigation changed in any meaningful way. Despite her uber-confidence and Irish accent, Ruth thought Finshore was good at her job. Drake had told Ruth before that he considered Finshore ‘very attractive’. She knew what he meant. Then again, Ruth was always attracted to powerful women.

  Hoping for a positive outcome to the meeting, Ruth knew that Finshore needed to be satisfied there was enough evidence to provide ‘a realistic prospect of conviction’ against both Kathy and Gareth Wright. Ruth was confident that it was now appropriate to present charges for the criminal court to consider, but the decision to proceed was now out of her hands.

  ‘As you know, Zara, we’ve made the decision to arrest both Gareth and Kathy Wright for the murder of Rosie Wright,’ Drake said as he leaned forward and poured water from a jug for them all. He slid the glass over to Finshore with his best winning smile. Bloody flirt. And he is married with kids. In that moment, Ruth noted the irony of her judgement.

  ‘Yes. I was up at the crack of dawn sifting through all the evidence. I’ve also spoken to the DPP. I’ve told him that we have now reached the first stage in the decision to prosecute. As you know, I need to be satisfied that there is enough evidence to get a conviction against each defendant on each charge.’ Finshore looked over at Drake for a moment. ‘DCI Drake, am I right in thinking that both suspects have admitted to the unlawful supply of class-A drugs?’

  Drake nodded. ‘Yes, although Kathy Wright is more reluctant. Gareth Wright is willing to make a deal and go into witness protection in exchange for information against Curtis Blake.’

  ‘But neither of them are willing to admit to the abduction and murder of Rosie Wright?’ Finshore asked with a slight frown.

  ‘No. They admit to being at the Gogarth cliffs on the evening that Rosie was taken. But they are both adamant they had nothing to do with it. We have Rosie’s blood in the car and at the car park. Matching footprints and soil samples that put them at the clifftop. GPS tracker that shows the journey that the car took,’ Ruth said.

  ‘Any positive ID?’ Finshore asked.

  ‘An elderly couple identified them from a computer-generated sample this afternoon. They saw Gareth and Kathy arrive and argue. They were both certain it was them.’

  ‘Would they testify at trial?’

  ‘They said that if they needed to testify, they would,’ Ruth explained.

  ‘That’s great. At the moment, it’s very hard to see what a defence counsel would come up with for them,’ Finshore said as she scribbled notes and then looked up at Ruth. ‘And we have motive?’

  ‘We believe that Rosie stumbled across what her mother and brother were doing at HMP Rhoswen. She was possibly thinking of going to the police with what she knew. We have a Google search and printout that we believe she carried out into the witness protection scheme and whether a teenager could enter into the programme. We also have a call to our switchboard from a Rosie asking to speak to an officer before hanging up,’ Ruth explained.

  ‘But this theory is hypothesis?’ Finshore said.

  ‘Yes,’ Drake said.

  ‘And of course, we don’t have a body,’ Finshore said as she flicked through her notes.

  Ruth could feel herself getting a little anxious, even though she knew this didn’t rule out a conviction.

  ‘Zara, there are precedents for this. I worked in the Met when the Danielle Jones case was going on just up the road in 2001. It’s very similar,’ Ruth said, hoping that she didn’t sound patronising.

  In June 2001, fifteen-year-old Danielle Jones was last seen walking to the bus stop near her home in East Tilbury, Essex, before disappearing. Within a couple of days her uncle, Stuart Campbell, became a suspect for her abduction. However, CID detectives had delayed his arrest because it might endanger Danielle’s life. At that stage, they hoped she was still alive and being held against her will. They hoped that their surveillance on Campbell would lead them to where he was keeping Danielle.

  Despite Danielle’s body never being found, the CPS brought a case of abduction and murder against Campbell. It was felt that the evidence against him was sufficient to go to trial. Danielle had disappeared without contacting her parents, which was completely out of character. She had also been seen talking to a man in a blue Ford Transit van resembling Campbell’s on the morning of her disappearance. Campbell and Danielle’s DNA was found during the testing of blood-stained stockings discovered in the loft of Campbell’s house. Danielle’s lip gloss was also found in Campbell’s home. The police had a strong suspicion that Campbell had developed an inappropriate relationship with Danielle that was also unlawful. When Danielle told him to leave
her alone or she would tell someone what they had been doing, Campbell abducted and murdered her.

  Part of Campbell’s defence was a text message that Campbell claimed Danielle had sent to him days after her disappearance. The message was sent in uppercase, however, Danielle always sent messages with the letters all in lowercase. Further analysis of the phone records showed that Campbell’s alibi of being at a retail park half an hour away when he received the message was false. In fact, Campbell and Danielle’s mobile phones had been within the range of just a single mobile phone mast at the time that the text message had allegedly been sent. This evidence showed that Campbell had written the message on Danielle’s phone and sent it to himself at the same location to make it appear that she was still alive. Campbell was sentenced to life imprisonment, but Danielle’s body was never found.

  ‘Yes, we’ve been to trial without a body before. It’s just rare. But as far as I can see, we have a very strong case. There are no reasons to question the reliability of the evidence, its accuracy or integrity. We have a very convincing hypothesis and a more than realistic prospect of conviction on all charges against both suspects.’ Looking up from her paperwork, Finshore sat back. ‘It’s my recommendation that Kathy and Gareth are now charged with Rosie Wright’s abduction and murder, and that we proceed to trial. We will oppose any requests for bail as I think they’re both a flight risk and given the severity of the charges against them.’

  Ruth let out an audible sigh and nodded over at Drake and then Finshore. ‘Thank you. It’s not the outcome we wanted when we started this case, but we have brought Rosie’s killers to justice. I just hope they are both put away for a very long time.’

  SIX DAYS, TWENTY-THREE hours

  It was late in the day, and now that Finshore and the CPS had agreed they’d charge Kathy and Gareth Wright with abduction and murder, Ruth had called in the members of CID who had been working on the case. The word had already got around and so the mood in the incident room was positive. Had it been a different case, there might have been laughter and even drinks, but a teenage girl had been murdered and one of their colleagues killed – no one was in the mood to celebrate going to trial.